Butte semi-weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1886-1890, 1887-01-22

Il soon got to the hotel. MY names Do
lany,' says I to the clerk. He taps the bell
and says to the black man, Show the gentle
man up to parlor B. says he.
"'Gentlemen!' thinks /, 'Parlor b. thinks
I, Its rfsfA'.@ the world I am. Maybe they'll
be maxim q 0pefectendent of an ould SOL
der, thinks I, and I followed the blackie, all
in a blind of wonder.
"Its q fine room I were shown into, and
nobody in it. The sarvant left and I was
smoothin' my hair before a big lookin' glass
that were there, when I heard a swish like a
dress aside me. I turned and there were
Mary-my Mary!-so beautiful, so like a
wistful at me.
"'Oh, daddy! she cried, holdin' out her two
arms and calm me by the name she called
mo when she were my own innocent little
baby. oh, daddy, listen to me now
"The anger rose up hot in me, though me
heart were beaten like 'twould burst me
breast and a lump in me throat were chokin'
me.
"'Nota word,' says I, mot a word With
deserters, and traitors. and worse! YOU'RE
dead to me! You were no more Mary Delany
from the night you left your parentsn
NO! SAy3 UcSps SIc1I SOIc, ouO ouCS
Mary Barton, and has heen from that same
night and out Of a room door, leadin' into
the parlor steps my old leftenant and put his
arm around her SO bold and lookin' SO hand
some, that I was ~speechless and moveless.
az struck the tears from my eyes, and
beard a little voice say. 'DrandadP a II l
looked down, and there was my little Mary,
three years ould, lookin' up at me-, an holdin'
in her hands that ouldf fife.
II looked from the child to the mother, to
the father. and l saw what IN ould brute and
fool I'd been. No need to tell me a word
more.
@'Tiss me, drandad! says the little one, and
I gathered her up, and ], that had never shed
a tear for sorrow or pain, run the eyes out of
me with cryin' for joy.
1--WE talked and we talked. They told me
how they had been in England and France
for Mary's education; how the leftenant's
people had joined them in Paris the year be-
fore, and how they all loved and thought
there was nobody like the ould sergeant's
Mary, the sons wife. And all this time, God
forgive me for bein' selfish, I were forgettin'
the poor Guild mother.
"The baby wa bundled up, houldin' the
ould fife that Mary had taken with her when
she went, and that baby had always played
with, and we we're soon in a carriage rolling
off to my poor home.
II went in first, little Mary in my arms.
Mrs. Delany was in hei in the back room.
'What KEEP ye, sargint? says she. 4 hope
'twas good luck. Yell find tn stew on the
stove'
"'The devil fly away with yer stew, Mrs.
Delany,' saysL I. Come out here and see the
stew I've brought YOU But before she could
move from the bed Mary was on her, and
well, you can guess the rest, happiness, the
talk, the tenderness of that night! I walked
the whole house with Yankee Doodle and
'Garryowen' on that fife, and with me feel.
FMS all worked and bein' out Of practice, too,
they were played bad enough to wake the
dead.
~There amt much more to tell. Our troubles
and heartaches were over. The next mornin
talkin' to Mary and the %leftenant, I says,
takin' a lot of letters out Of my pocket, If
you young people are short Of money there's
over So, 600 that belongs to you, that's beer.
sent to me for five years back
"'Oh, you dear, proud old daddy! cried
Mary, with her arms about my neck and
tears in her eyes and voice, and you wouldn't
use it in all your needs? I might AVE known
1t, thinking what you did of me-
"Well, sir, that money went to buy n little
farm where I and the ould wife live like .
lady, and of course it will go back to them
that gave it when We die.
"There's a boy now sir. I'm going to see
him christened Delany Barton, and hes to be
q soldier. They're none of them ashamed OF
the ould sergeant and bis wife, but she's not
able to travel, and so l bave to report alone
Will ! take a sup out of your flask, sir?
swell, talkin's dry work and I've been
dom a power Of it; a sup would go well TOY
but if you'll excuse me, I won't take it. Ten
minutes will tring me to where they're all
waitin' for me, and I'd rather not kiss Mary
and the babies with the Taste touch of it Oh
my lips"
In ten minutes we stopped at a station. tho
old sergeant stepped from the cars, and as
we moved Oft he was still the center of a
beautiful, loving group.-Col. Duke Battle
m New York Mercury.